Saturday, July 16, 2011

Unlike another popular TV show of the time -- "The Fugitive" -- the "Dick Van Dyke Show" left the air not with a bang but a whimper. Except for brief scenes at beginning and end, the final episode consists solely of repeated scenes from threeearlierepisodes.

An extended dream sequence that's a parody of the classic Western, "High Noon" -- complete with a nice imitation of Gary Cooper by DVD.

The episode contains what I believe is the only scene of the entire series that was filmed outdoors -- Rob riding on his horse in the Old West town. (There was one other brief outdoor scene in an earlier episode, but it was stock footage of a car driving along a highway and no characters were visible).

Jerry and Millie feel threatened by the Petries' new neighbors, who seem to be replacing the Helpers in Rob's and Laura's affections.

Joby Baker has the distinction of having played not one, but two, of the most annoying characters on the DVD Show: The fake bullfighter, and the husband of Laura's childhood friend who moves in next door.

Quotes:

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Rob: "You willing to give up your trip to Italy?"

Laura: "Why?"

Rob: "Well, I'm gonna try and get a couple of more tickets, and that's just about what it's gonna cost."

Laura: "Well, it'd be worth it anyway."

Rob: "I don't know, I bet the first day off the boat I'd meet four Italians I like better than Jerry."

In an earlier blog entry, I noted the unlikely configuration of the Petries' house. The episode "The Man from My Uncle" highlights the difficulty of trying to draw a floor plan for the house that would make sense in real life, and still fit the clues we're given about the layout of the Petrie home.

I'm aware of at least two attempts by others to draw a floor plan: One is in a book of blueprints of various fictional TV houses; the other is an online picture that I found by browsing the web. Both versions arrive at solutions that ignore many clues given during the episodes of the DVD Show. One of them even contains numerous blatant discrepancies that conflict with what is plainly seen on the show. So I decided to try my own solution.

The main problem is the part of the house containing the den (or guest room) and Richie's room. Here's what we know about the rooms:

The den -- this room, which we never see (except for its entrance off the living room), must extend off to the right, as viewed from the living room -- because every character who enters the room turns right -- every single time.

Richie's room -- From "The Man From My Uncle", we know that Richie's room:

(a) has a window facing the house across the street

(b) is reached by a hallway, and is entered by approaching from the left of the hall, as seen from inside the room.

Item (a) is no problem; that would position the room to the left of the den, as seen from the living room; and that fits with the wall that can be seen through the open front door of the house. But item (b) is a real problem. How can you go past the den, enter from the hall on the correct side, and be at the front of the house -- unless the layout is something like this:

It's a layout that makes no sense. No architect would design a hallway that wraps completely around a room, as this hall wraps around the den. Yet this layout seems to be required in order to make everything fit together as shown on the program.

In that case there would be multiple houses, in different directions, visible from rooms in the house -- like this:

Now everything falls into place. Richie's room is located like this:

Richie's bedroom window still looks out across the street -- but at a 90-degree angle from the front door. The den is not surrounded by the hallway, but instead has exterior walls with windows on one or even two walls of the room.

The rest of the house is fairly easy to lay out. The following drawing is certainly not to scale; distances and angles are too hard to determine on a 2-D television screen. Green areas are those we see on the show; yellow areas are never seen, and therefore are purely speculative on my part.

I've left out the positioning of the basement, and the stairs to the basement. You can only go so far with a project like this...

1 - Front Door

2 - Coat closet

3 - Den (the little wall inside the door is awkwardly placed. Perhaps it's a structural element -- maybe made necessary by the boulder in the basement?)

4 - Step up/down

5 - Bay window

6 - wood stove on brick hearth

7 - Pass through window to kitchen

8 - Ottoman

9 - Piano (usually seen only at parties; once seen against this wall of the room)

10 - Kitchen

11 - Broom closet

12 - Sliding glass doors

13 - Laundry room (never seen but once mentioned; this seems like a logical location)

14 - Garage (orienting the garage in this way makes sense if the street curves around the house as I've speculated)

15 - Wood deck (I've assumed the arms of the U shape; it would explain why the Helpers don't come in straight from outside the sliding door, and also gives a location for the grill (16) that was implied in that location in one episode.

17 - Master bedroom. I've drawn it as a trapezoid instead of a rectangle, as a close observation of the room while watching the show reveals an angle > 90 degrees between the wall with the window, and the wall the beds are against.

In "Talk to the Snail", Alan Brady states that his show is ranked #7. Mel corrects him, indicating the show is #17. Is that good, or bad? Consider the competition the "Alan Brady Show" would have had, if it had been a real program in the 1965-66 season:

First, there were nearly a dozen variety shows at that time -- that type show had not yet begun to die out, though it would do so shortly. Alan would have been competing with, among others: Andy Williams, Steve Lawrence, Red Skelton, Danny Kaye, Dean Martin, Jimmy Dean, the King Family, the Smothers Brothers, Jackie Gleason, Lawrence Welk, and Ed Sullivan.

Sitcoms, however, were dominating the ratings, with "The Lucy Show", "The Andy Griffith Show", "Bewitched", "Gomer Pyle", "Hogan's Heroes", and "The Beverly Hillbillies" all in the top 10. Others in the top 20 included "My Three Sons", "Get Smart", "Green Acres" ---- and, of course, "The Dick Van Dyke Show" (on Wednesday nights).

Other programs of note included the game show "I've Got a Secret", "Gilligan's Island", "Daniel Boone", "The Man From UNCLE", "Flipper", "Lassie", "Petticoat Junction", and "I Dream of Jeannie". The number one show overall? Bonanza, then in its seventh season.

Considering the fact that many of these shows can still be seen in syndicated re-runs almost 50 years later, it's safe to say that the '65-'66 season was a strong one -- and that Rob, Sally, and Buddy were doing very well if they were keeping an obsolescent program type in 7th -- or even 17th -- place.

Thinking that Alan Brady is about to cut the writing staff, Rob, Buddy, and Sally consider taking a job writing for a puppet.

Jelly Bean appears to be a gastropod version of Topo Gigio, the little mouse puppet who was appearing regularly at the time on the "Ed Sullivan Show". But the similarity was only physical; while Topo Gigio was a sweet, shy, gentle creature, Jelly Bean was rude, arrogant, and prone to violence.

One of the most unusual episodes of the series. It does have the normal quota of laughs, but concludes with a solemn depiction of Buddy's 30-years-delayed bar mitzvah -- with his honored guests including Mel Cooley.

Quotes:

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Buddy: “There’s these two big recording stars, but big. And they fall in love and decide to get married, but I don’t think it’ll work out – he’s 45 and she’s 33 1/3.”

Thursday, July 14, 2011

The final Army days flashback of the series takes place not at Camp Crowder, but at Rob's later post in Anchor, Texas; eight miles from the Mexican border, and in a location so remote that Rob confesses to Buddy and Sally that, though he lived there once, he doesn't really know where it is. (Unlike Crowder, Anchor is a fictional location -- as is El Diablo, the Mexican town Rob and Laura visit).

Food notes: When Rob burns the steaks on the grill, he asks Laura to call "Chicken Little" for delivery. Though fast food had been around for a while, I'm assuming delivery was still relatively novel at that time.

Also, when Richie enters the kitchen wearing a sombrero and serape, Buddy makes a quip that sounds like a reference to the Frito Bandito (although, according to the linked article, that ad campaign started a year or two after this DVD episode).

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

The final two-part episode of the series. Rob is asked to run for New Rochelle City Council -- but he's not sure he's up to the job, especially after he meets his intellectually intimidating opponent. Nevertheless, he wins the election. Then his status as city councilman is never again mentioned on the show.

At the time of Rob's election, New Rochelle is at its population peak, with about 76,000 residents. The population then begins to decline for the next three decades, before starting a comeback at the beginning of the 21st century:

Adamo sighting: The only one of the five reporters at the press conference who doesn't ask a question.

Quotes:

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Buddy: “Rob, you want my advice?”

Rob: “No.”

Buddy: “Good decision; now while you’re in the mood, make another one!”

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Sally: “Rob, you’ll be fine once you get there.”

Rob: “Yeah, I think that’s what they said to the captain of the Titanic.”

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Laura: “Look, it says right here that Lincoln was only a private in the army. You were a sergeant, a much better leader.”

Rob: “He wasn’t promoted because he spent most of his time in an Italian prison camp.”

Rob recalls the time he was laid off from his writing job with the Brady show, right after he started working there -- and with bills to pay and a baby on the way.

It's interesting to see the Petrie living room with no furniture in it; I hadn't noticed before that the hearth extends out into the room -- it's normally hidden by the love seat that's near the fireplace.

This is the last of the Camp Crowder flashback episodes (though there is one more flashback to Army days, it does not take place at Crowder). Rob tells Buddy and Sally about the time he fought "Boom Boom" Bailey for the camp middleweight championship.

Another opportunity for DVD to show off his physical comedy chops, as he performs an hilarious series of boxing ring gags.

Quotes:

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Rob: “Everybody in the Army had to fight three fights.”

Buddy: “Yeah, that’s right: the Germans, the Japanese, and the Italians.”

When Richie and his friend Freddie use a marker to connect the freckles on the back of a sleeping Rob, the result is an outline of the Liberty Bell. Millie submits the story to "Odd, But True" (a take-off on "Ripley's Believe It Or Not").

Saturday, July 9, 2011

Many long-running TV shows eventually "jump the shark". Did the DVD Show ever do so?

Season 5 had some excellent episodes: "The Great Petrie Fortune"; "See Rob Write; Write, Rob, Write"; "The Man From My Uncle"; and the unusual "Buddy Sorrell, Man and Boy".

But there were some unsatisfying episodes as well: "Draw Me a Pear"; "Viva Petrie"; "You Ought to Be in Pictures".

However, all the seasons had their good and not-so-good episodes. What made Season 5 a little different from the others is that the series began to have a slightly different feel.

Seasons 1-4 seemed to be more or less frozen in time. With a few exceptions, you can watch the episodes from those seasons in random order. But in Season 5, things started to change some. It's as if everyone became a bit restless. Rob's hair was longer; Laura adopted a very different hairstyle in the middle of the the season. Rob's focus had always been on his home and his job; now he ran for city council. An old friend of Laura's moved, with her husband, into the neighborhood -- seemingly threatening the bond between the Helpers and Petries. Alan Brady acknowledged that his show would someday come to an end. Richie was well past the age when he was the cute little kid singing "You're the Top".

Did the Dick Van Dyke Show ever "jump the shark". No, it never did; but I have a feeling it might have, if it had continued on to Season 6.

The designer of the saucer, whom Rob and Buddy finally meet, was apparently a genius of uneven talent: He invented an anti-gravity device to power his toy saucer; but was unable to make a recorded message say "Merry Christmas" instead of "Uhny Ufts".

During Rob and Laura's weekend getaway at an expensive Manhattan hotel, Laura takes a bath -- with unexpected consequences.

This episode included several actors who appeared numerous times on the DVD Show: Bernard Fox as the house detective (previously the writing teacher who hit on Laura, and the father of the little girl who beat up Richie); Bill Idelson as a bellboy (previously Herman Glimsher, Sally's boyfriend); Kathleen Freeman as a maid (previously owner of the boarding house where Rob and Laura spent their honeymoon); and Johnny Silver as a room service waiter (appeared in several episodes, usually as a waiter).

Quotes:

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Rob: “Only a husband can blow the lock off a bathroom with his wife in the bathtub with nothing on and her -- and her toe stuck in a pipe! Now call me a prude if you like!”

--

Engineer: “Tell me, is that toe similar to the one that’s stuck in the pipe?”

Laura: “Well, of course it is. Why?”

Engineer: “Wouldn’t want to nip off any of this little piggy. That’s the one that went to market.”

Frank Adamo was DVD's assistant and stand-in on the show. From the early days of the series, he was often used as an extra (it seems the Petries seldom had a party at their house that Frank didn't attend), and occasionally he had small speaking roles. By my rough count, he had appeared in almost a quarter of the episodes as of the end of the fourth season.

Friday, July 8, 2011

There are a number of continuity issues around the Petries' homes. In "Fifty Two Forty Five or Work", Laura is pregnant, and the couple has just moved into the New Rochelle house. But in Where Did I Come From?", Rob and Laura depart from their old house to the hospital for Richie's birth. Then in "That's My Boy??", they come home from the hospital to the new house, in New Rochelle.

In "Hustling the Hustler", we see a nicely decorated basement in the Petries' home, with a pool table in it. But in this flashback episode, we see them buying their New Rochelle house -- and it has a giant boulder in the basement. In addition, it's stated that the Helpers' house is a mirror image of the Petries' -- but that's not the case, as shown in numerous episodes that feature the Helper home.

Quotes:

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Rob: “Three hundred dollars? I ought to be able to get a better friend than Jerry for that!”

Thursday, July 7, 2011

Unfortunately, the song written by Rob and his Army pal "Sticks" Mandalay failed to chart -- apparently selling fewer than 1,000 copies in the first few weeks. It's hard to believe the song fared so poorly; after all, this is a catchy number: